NEW YORK — It was a blowout that bloated into a laugher that morphed into a demolition and finished as a historic annihilation.
No. 3 Duke handed Illinois its worst loss in program history with a 110-67 landslide victory Saturday night at Madison Square Garden.
This was supposed to be a game that spotlighted the rarity of a special circumstance: two big-name programs finding a way in the modern era to schedule each other in a nonconference game in the February.
As good as it was to have this matchup — and as I wrote Friday, we’re likely to get more of them in the years to come, thankfully — that element was completely obliterated by Duke’s latest display of cartoonish dominance that gives credence to the possibility that this program can win its first national title without Mike Krzyzewski on the sidelines.
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The pre-game buzz in the arena was on the level of a Friday night semifinal at the Big East Tournament. And then the evening’s festivities fizzled by the midway point of the first half. The Blue Devils led 30-16 11 minutes in and sprinted away thereafter. Seven players finished in double figures, with the second half effectively playing out like recess.
It got so out of hand that one of the biggest roars of the night came for Spencer Hubbard. Who the hell is Spencer Hubbard? He’s a 5-foot-7 grad student walk-on who got a memory he’ll be telling to friends, family and eventually his grandchildren decades from now. The game was so over so early that Hubbard and a few other walk-ons were gifted 2 minutes and 13 seconds of uninterrupted play at the World’s Most Famous Arena.
After some anxious cheering on a few consecutive possessions, Hubbard gave the fans what they wanted — and sent the Duke crowd into a frenzy with a step-back 3-pointer that swished with 48.4 seconds remaining, getting Duke to its final tally of 110 points. It’s the most by Duke since a 113-49 win over Stetson in December 2018.
Unfortunately, the game lacked an iota of drama. Even Cooper Flagg’s MSG debut didn’t exactly sparkle. He was muted on offense through the first half (just four points) but it didn’t matter because Duke tore through Illinois elsewhere. Flagg finished with 16 points, seven rebounds and five assists.
“I don’t know what message it sends,” Flagg said when asked about the margin of victory. Can you blame him? Duke’s gotten accustomed to destroying teams. It treated Illinois like a cellar dweller of the woeful ACC. “It’s just a good opportunity to get outside the bubble of the ACC and play a different team we hadn’t played before.”
The Blue Devils are 24-3 and now rate No. 1 in most predictive metrics, including KenPom and EvanMiya. It’s fairly obvious that this team’s best is as good as anyone’s in the country. Yes, even Auburn. (Of course, Duke beat Auburn at Cameron Indoor Stadium back in December.)
“You don’t think you’re going to beat Illinois by that amount, of course not,” Duke coach Jon Scheyer told CBS Sports.
It was so bad, Illinois didn’t hit its first 3-pointer until the 16-minute mark of the second half. Most Illinois fans in attendance erupted in sardonic applause; the Illini had missed its first 17 triples to that point. Illinois finished 2-of-26 from deep, its worst display from beyond the arc since 2000. The Fighting Illini have been fighting a brutal virus that has torn through the team. Underwood told me in his 38 years of coaching he’s never had a worse month of unavailability for practice at any point that what he’s just experienced.
That said, even if Illinois could have been full strength across the board on Saturday, it had no chance. Illinois has dropped three straight games by 14-plus points and is 3-5 in its last eight.
“We won’t forget this,” Underwood told CBS Sports on his walk back to the locker room. “We need to feel what this experience was like, playing in the Garden, experience 20,000 people, experience the ass-whooping and not forget it.”
Illinois only had nine turnovers, but it looked outclassed well before halftime. It takes two to get to a 43-point margin, but Saturday was more about Duke.
It’s fair to speculate that this team could become one with the greats in program history. Duke’s won four straight game by an average of 29.5 points (insane) since its Feb. 8 loss at Clemson, the team’s lone defeat in ACC play. It’s outscoring teams by more than 23 points on average this season, which could set the school record if the pace continues.
This is Scheyer’s 15th season with Duke as a player, assistant and head coach. Of the previous 14, three have made the Final Four or better; most have been a No. 1 or 2 seed. I asked Scheyer which group this one most closely resembles from any previous Duke team.
“This team is unique in its own right,” Scheyer told me. “Can you say the connectivity of the ’15 team? Sure, but I’ve tried really not to compare because this team has come together in its own unique way, which I love.”
Scheyer is now three wins away from setting the record for most victories in the first three seasons by an ACC coach (Bill Guthridge won 80 from 1997-2000).
At this point the Blue Devils are just playing out the string until we get to the NCAA Tournament. We’re going to have to wait until late March to see this team face a team anywhere near its orbit. It doesn’t mean Duke’s destined to run the table from now until Selection Sunday, but if that wound up being the case it wouldn’t surprise a single person who’s followed college basketball closely this season.
Duke is great, for sure, but with basically two exceptions over the past 10 weeks, it can’t find a close game. No one in the ACC — outside of Clemson — has given resistance. That’s dipped a little bit of the drawing appeal for this team, even with Flagg vying against Auburn’s Johni Broome for national player of the year.
Illinois is easily NCAA Tournament-bound, and look what we got. Scheyer wanted this game as an NCAA Tournament tune-up. It looked more like a first round walkover than the second-weekend preview it was promoted as.
Yes, Duke’s beatable. We’ve seen that three times and probably will see it at least one more. But at its best, Duke could be historically great. It’s pushing to be a top-three all time KenPom team, meaning its efficiency is nearing the best of the best in the modern era. Saturday was the warning shot to the rest of college basketball. It only took until Year 3, but Duke is already back to that familiar place. For the first time under Jon Scheyer, the Blue Devils are a Goliath of college basketball again.
